Thursday 20th Feb.; In every life a little rain must fall and sadly today I have unpicked far more than I have sewn. I did finally get the second pocket in,[bottom left below] then I did a few dummy bound buttonholes, – O.K.ish but not what I want for this jacket. I am determined to festine lente on this one – hasten slowly and get it right. When I re-activated this blog a year ago I had come from many years of preferring hand sewing and tailoring, so I was used to pinning, tacking and taking my time sewing – but this year I was determined to conquer my aversion to using my sewing machine, particularly the buttonholing attachment. I had always thought of using the machine for ‘rush’ jobs and none too hopeful on the outcome, I was often proved right. The situation has changed somewhat and my sewing machine is now usually my ally and trusty friend – but not today. Feeling a bit ‘blah!’ about sewing and unpicking…..I thought I would stitch the buttonholes on the sleeves before sewing them up. A nice safe job I thought. The trial buttonholes worked very well, but in the middle of the real thing my trusty friend coughed loudly and fouled up yards of sewing thread. Yet another unpicking job.

However, not all doom and gloom, a few more minor adjustments made. I thought about shaving off the generous curve of the lapel and make it a straight ‘no nonsense’ lapel instead, which I think is an improvement – what do you think?. I did manage to sew the back and side back pieces together without a hitch and pressed them. No problems there, back finished. However, having done that I could now pin the fronts and back together and try it on – then I noticed that the front pouched a bit above the bust, clearly needing refitting again. More unpicking, but now tacked properly, ready to sew tomorrow. the picture on the right above shows the adjustment on the right front [left side as you look at it from the front]. The left side has not yet been adjusted. Hopefully it will be a lot better than today. As Scarlet O’Hara once famously said “I’ll think about it tomorrow. Tomorrow is another day”.